Gina Trapani

The Yahoo! Widgets blog provides a detailed comparison of the crowded desktop widget/gadget area, weighing the pros and cons of Google Gadgets, Vista Sidebar, Mac's Dashboard and Yahoo!'s Widget Engine (oh, let's just call it Konfabulator). One interesting point is about OS-specific widgets/gadgets (like Sidebar and Dashboard), which use browser-specific DHTML to run:

DHTML is great for those people who only care about one platform, or have a strong needs or desires to use DHTML. It's familiar and fairly simple. Plus, these systems are built-into the OS, so no extra software is required. But the resources required to drive such a Widget can be a bit excessive, and you're limited to the one platform.

The conclusion is very Konfabulator-positive (this is their blog) but overall makes a lot of informative comparison points for developers and users. What's your favorite gadget/widget engine right now, if any? Let us know in the comments. — Gina Trapani